Featured Research

from universities, journals, and other organizations

Ancient jugs hold the secret to practical mathematics in Biblical times

Date:

June 4, 2012

Source:

American Friends of Tel Aviv University

Summary:

Archaeologists and mathematicians alike have been puzzled for centuries by the use of spherical jugs in trade in the ancient world, and how merchants measured the volume of the commodities they held. Now researchers have revealed that these ancient cultures had their own unique means of measurement, accurate enough for business and other uses.

Share This

Archaeologists in the eastern Mediterranean region have been unearthing spherical jugs, used by the ancients for storing and trading oil, wine, and other valuable commodities. Because we're used to the metric system, which defines units of volume based on the cube, modern archaeologists believed that the merchants of antiquity could only approximately assess the capacity of these round jugs.

Credit: Image courtesy of American Friends of Tel Aviv University

Archaeologists in the eastern Mediterranean region have been unearthing spherical jugs, used by the ancients for storing and trading oil, wine, and other valuable commodities. Because we're used to the metric system, which defines units of volume based on the cube, modern archaeologists believed that the merchants of antiquity could only approximately assess the capacity of these round jugs, says Prof. Itzhak Benenson of Tel Aviv University's Department of Geography.

Related Articles

Now an interdisciplinary collaboration between Prof. Benensonand Prof. Israel Finkelstein of TAU's Department of Archaeology and Ancient Near Eastern Cultures has revealed that, far from relying on approximations, merchants would have had precise measurements of their wares -- and therefore known exactly what to charge their clients.

The researchers discovered that the ancients devised convenient mathematical systems in order to determine the volume of each jug. They theorize that the original owners and users of the jugs measured their contents through a system that linked units of length to units of volume, possibly by using a string to measure the circumference of the spherical container to determine the precise quantity of liquid within.

The system, which the researchers believe was developed by the ancient Egyptians and used in the Eastern Mediterranean from about 1,500 to 700 BCE, was recently reported in the journal PLoS ONE. Its discovery was part of the Reconstruction of Ancient Israel project supported by the European Union.

3D models unveil volume measurement system

The system of measurement was revealed when mathematician Elena Zapassky constructed 3D models of jugs from Tel Megiddo -- an important Canaanite city-state and Israelite administration center -- for a computer database. The jugs are associated with the Phoenicians, ancient seafaring merchants who had trading hubs along the coast of Lebanon. Using a statistical methodology, the team measured hundreds of vessels from the excavation, and discovered something surprising -- large groups of these spherical or elliptic jugs had a similar circumference. This prompted the researchers to look more deeply into how the ancients measured volume.

The Egyptian unit of volume is called the hekat, and it equals 4.8 liters in today's measurements, explains Dr. Yuval Gadot, a researcher on the project. A spherical jug that is 52 centimeters in circumference, which equals one Egyptian royal cubit, contains exactly half a hekat. "In a large percentage of the vessels we measured, the circumference is close to one cubit, and the merchant could know that the vessel's volume is half a cubit by just measuring its circumference," he says.

When the researchers adopted the Egyptian system of measurement themselves instead of thinking in metrical units, many things became clear. For example, the tall round "torpedo" jugs packed into Phoenician ships in the 8th century BCE were found to contain whole units of hekats. Dr. Gadot believes that the Egyptian system of measurement gradually disappeared when the Assyrians took over the region, bringing their own methods of measurement with them.

A measure of political power

According to Prof. Finkelstein, elements of standardization in the ancient world hold interest because they are indicative of bureaucratic systems and reflect political and cultural influences. "The use of the Egyptian method is a strong indicator of Egyptian power in this region during a specific period of time," he explains.

"Working together with experts in mathematics and statistics, we have been able to provide new solutions for longstanding archaeological problems and debates."

More From ScienceDaily

More Fossils & Ruins News

Featured Research

Mar. 31, 2015  Geoscientists have revealed information about how continents were generated on Earth more than 2.5 billion years ago -- and how those processes have continued within the last 70 million years to ... full story

Mar. 31, 2015  The volcanologist Stephen Self, an expert on super-eruptions, was the first modern-day scientist to visit Tambora in Indonesia, the site of the largest volcanic eruption in 1,000 years. On the 200th ... full story

Mar. 31, 2015  Scientists have uncovered the earliest fossilized evidence of an insect caring for its young. The findings push back the earliest direct evidence of insect brood care by more than 50 million years, ... full story

Mar. 31, 2015  Paleontologists have discovered two new species of Saurichthys. The ~242 million year old predatory fishes were found in the fossil Lagerstไtte Monte San Giorgio, in Ticino. They are distinct from ... full story

Mar. 31, 2015  In the 1990s the discovery of the oldest human made and completely preserved wooden hunting weapons made the Paleolithic excavation site in Schoningen internationally renowned. Contained within the ... full story

Mar. 30, 2015  A new study reports that marine ecosystems can take thousands, rather than hundreds, of years to recover from climate-related upheavals. The study's authors analyzed thousands of invertebrate fossils ... full story

Mar. 27, 2015  What do butterflies, spiders and lobsters have in common? They are all surviving relatives of a newly identified species called Yawunik kootenayi, a marine creature with two pairs of eyes and ... full story

Mar. 27, 2015  Scientists have produced a 3-D reconstruction of the remains of a two-year-old Neanderthal recovered from an excavation carried out back in the 1970s at La Ferrassie (Dordogne, France). The work ... full story

Mar. 26, 2015  New research harnessing fragmentary fossils suggests our genus has come in different shapes and sizes since its origins over two million years ago, and adds weight to the idea that humans began to ... full story

Featured Videos

Ancient Egyptian Beer Making Vessels Discovered in Israel

AFP (Mar. 30, 2015)  Fragments of pottery used by Egyptians to make beer and dating back 5,000 years have been discovered on a building site in Tel Aviv, the Israeli Antiquities Authority said on Sunday. Duration: 00:51
Video provided by AFP

Related Stories

Feb. 12, 2015  For the first time, grape seeds from the Byzantine era have been found. These grapes were used to produce "the Wine of the Negev" -- one of the finest and most renowned wines in the whole ... full story

June 16, 2014  Millions of ancient looted coins from archaeological excavations enter the black market yearly, and a researcher who has seen plundered sites likens the thefts to stealing “smoking guns” from ... full story

Mar. 5, 2014  Making your own stuff with a 3-D printer is vastly cheaper than what you'd pay for manufactured goods, even factoring in the cost of buying the plastic filament. Yet, you can drive the cost down ... full story

Feb. 3, 2014  Using radiocarbon dating, archaeologists can pinpoint the moment when domesticated camels arrived in the southern Levant. Their findings further emphasize the disagreements between Biblical texts and ... full story

Dec. 28, 2010  New archeological research from the Tel Qudadi archaeological dig near Tel Aviv suggests an ancient link between the Israeli city and the Greek island of Lesbos -- a find producing new insights into ... full story

ScienceDaily features breaking news and videos about the latest discoveries in health, technology, the environment, and more -- from major news services and leading universities, scientific journals, and research organizations.